Fabric items and fabric item stains have coexisted for as long as fabric items have been made. Fabric items can, for example, be wearable apparel items or non-wearable items. Further, food stains, grass stains, and stains of all sorts are common to both wearable apparel items and non-wearable items. One reality of treating and removing fabric stains is that such stains must be treated with some sort of chemical pretreatment prior to laundering. In most instances, however, it is not practical to treat and launder the stained fabric item immediately upon the stain occurring. For this reason, as is true in most households, stained fabric items tend to be accumulated with other fabric items for washing at a later time. However, by the time the stained and non-stained items are sorted for washing, it may be hard to locate each stained item and the exact area that is stained. Thus, stained items may be laundered without a chemical pretreatment due to error and the fabric item may be ruined. A system and method for marking, tracking, and locating stained fabric items for application of a stain treatment prior to laundering is a useful invention.
A fabric item may be stained and then, placed in a laundry hamper for an extended period of time before laundering. By the time the laundry is sorted for laundering, the stained fabric item may be forgotten and placed in the laundering equipment as if it were not stained. The proper chemical pretreatment may not be applied to the stained fabric item and as a result, it may be ruined after laundering. A system and method that can mark, and then locate and track stained items in a pile of stained and non-stained items is a useful invention.
Also, if there is an extended period of time between the fabric item being stained and laundering, a user may remember that a particular fabric item is stained, but may not remember precisely where the stain is. If the stain cannot be located, it cannot be pretreated and the fabric item can be ruined. If there are multiple stains, then the user may chemically pretreat one stain, but may miss the others and again, the fabric item may be ruined. A system and method that can mark, and then locate and track not only the fabric item that is stained, but the precise location of the stain or stains is a useful invention.
Finally, most laundry equipment uses a range of preset parameters to perform cleaning cycles on fabric items to be laundered. For example, a washing machine may have a range of water temperatures for a presoak cycle, a washing cycle, and a rinsing cycle, with water temperature for each cycle being anywhere from “cold” to “hot,” and with several points of gradation between. Similarly, the washing machine may have agitation parameters from “delicate” to “heavy-duty.” The presence of a particular kind of stain on a fabric item can make it desirable for the washing parameters to be changed from what would normally be used for that item. For example, exposure to heat will “set” or make some stains more difficult to remove completely, whereas for others hot water is a more effective solvent. Likewise, the use of various detergents or fabric treating agents may be contraindicated when trying to remove some stains. A system and method that can track information about stains and communicate it to a control and/or display mechanism in a laundry machine so that the stains can be viewed and appropriate steps taken to treat and launder them is a useful invention.